My ex-partner has recently made some pretty extreme allegations about me, accusing me of some terrible acts of child abuse.

This has come out of the blue, as we have been co-operating quite well with the kids lately.

Although I was really shocked by these allegations, they were not entirely unexpected given that my ex has experienced psychological issues on and off since I first met him.

I have recently been told that he visits a psychologist near his work, and I am worried as to how his strange paranoia may end up affecting the kids one day.

If my ex was to take me to Court (I am assuming that this will be his end-game given the nature of the allegations), can I subpoena his psychological records from his psychologist?

I am asking this question because I have been given conflicting information on this, but can remember references to client/patient privilege that I often hear on TV shows.

Hi, Claudine, I'm a psychologist, not a lawyer, but am pretty familiar with the process. You can subpoena whatever you want, but be careful because there's a limit to how many you may be allowed, so you may have to decide which are more important. Registrars may refuse to grant some for various reasons, so it's about trying to get what you need in a targeted way.

If you know the psychologist for sure, then you can subpoena records directly. Chances are an objection will be raised by the psychologist, which the registrar or judge may or may not overrule. If you don't know the psychologist, then you would probably have to either hire a private detective to find out (expensive but doable) or subpoena his Medicare records and look for items 80110 or 80115 or similar, and find out who the provider is that charged Medicare for the service. However if he's seeing the psychologist privately, there may not be a medicare record of treatment, although he may have gotten a referral from his GP in a mental health consultation. Item numbers can be tracked down here:http://www.health.gov.au/internet/main/publishing.nsf/Content/pacd-gp-mental-health-care-pdf-qa

The other possibility is that his employer is covering it under an Employee Assistance Programme, in which case the target of the subpoena would be the EAP provider for his company (possibly you can find out from HR if you don't already know).

Lastly, he's gone to a psychologist privately, not touching any paper-trail generating systems. This leaves you with the PI.

Don't forget, you have to weight the cost of a PI against the possible wasting of subpoenas. Some things are worth more than dollars.

All of the preceding went to evidence, but if his allegations get taken seriously enough for a psych evaluation of you to be done, then you could argue that his allegations are themselves evidence of delusional thinking on his part and go tit-for-tat and get an assessment of him done. As part of your arguments you can ask the judge to require him to provide all past records from counselling to the forensic person doing the report. If he lies about that saying he hasn't been, and your PI can prove that he has, I would expect that things will not go well for him.

My ex-partner has recently made some pretty extreme allegations about me, accusing me of some terrible acts of child abuse.

This has come out of the blue, as we have been co-operating quite well with the kids lately.

Although I was really shocked by these allegations, they were not entirely unexpected given that my ex has experienced psychological issues on and off since I first met him.

I have recently been told that he visits a psychologist near his work, and I am worried as to how his strange paranoia may end up affecting the kids one day.

If my ex was to take me to Court (I am assuming that this will be his end-game given the nature of the allegations), can I subpoena his psychological records from his psychologist?

I am asking this question because I have been given conflicting information on this, but can remember references to client/patient privilege that I often hear on TV shows.

add you reply here...Hi im new to this site so im not sure when this was posted. the same thing happened to me and in florida this is what i did. Chances are all of what is listed in his motion is not in anyway probable with facts. therefore you can obgect to it being hearsay. That got all of what she filed droped. I dont know if you would want his doctors files as it may not have what you want. i would ask the judge if he would allow a psychological evalution for your ex and if i was you i would get one yourself as it shows you arent hiding. but get them done at the same agreed on facility. And share your reports..